1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a vehicle seat and a method for manufacturing the same. More specifically, the invention relates to a vehicle seat including paired right and left recliners that respectively connect side frames in right and left sides of a seat back to a base on or above a floor, operating pins that are respectively inserted through the recliners in an axial direction and are rotated about axes thereof to respectively unlock the recliners, and a rod that integrally connects the operating pins to each other, and the invention also relates to a method for manufacturing the vehicle seat.
2. Description of Related Art
Japanese Patent Application Publication No. 2-299608 (JP 2-299608A) describes a vehicle seat in which a seat back is connected to a seat cushion via paired right and left recliners. The recliners are normally maintained in a locked state in which a reclining angle of the seat back is fixed. Both of the recliners are unlocked and the state of the seat back is switched to the state in which the reclining angle of the seat back can be changed, by pulling up an unlocking lever provided on a side portion of the seat cushion on a vehicle outer side. More specifically, operating pins that respectively unlock the recliners are respectively inserted through the recliners from an inner side in an axial direction, and are respectively fitted to the recliners. The operating pins are integrally connected to each other via a rod. The unlocking lever is fitted to an outer end portion of the operating pin on the vehicle outer side. Thus, when the unlocking lever is pulled up, both of the operating pins are rotated together about the axes thereof, and both of the recliners are unlocked.
In the related art, the operating pins are respectively inserted through the side frames of the seat back from a seat inner side, and are respectively fitted to the side frames in the state in which the operating pins are positioned. Accordingly, in order to dispose the operating pins integrally connected to the rod between the side frames, the operating pins integrally connected to the rod need to be inserted into the side frames before the side frames are integrally connected to each other. Otherwise, it would not be possible to insert the rod into the operating pins, and therefore, it would be necessary to bring the rod into contact with the operating pins from an outer side in a radial direction and to weld the rod to the operating pins. Accordingly, the man-hour would be increased due to, for example, the operation of deforming end portions of the rod, and in addition, the connection strength between the operating pins and the rod may not be appropriately increased.